


Canaima

by subjectivelyfunctional (shakespeareanwolf)



Series: Canaima [1]
Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Alternate Universe - Shapeshifters, Animagus, Good Original Percival Graves, Hurt Original Percival Graves, Kidnapping, Original Percival Graves Needs a Hug, Post-Canon, Post-Movie 1: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Team as Family, graves escapes from grindelwald, shapeshifter graves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-14
Updated: 2018-06-14
Packaged: 2019-05-23 11:55:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14933798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shakespeareanwolf/pseuds/subjectivelyfunctional
Summary: Graves tries to find the best of his situation while Grindelwald has his life being torn to shambles. He waits for the day he's removed from his cell.





	Canaima

**Author's Note:**

> aye this is gonna be the first work in a series of things I just wanted to go ahead and post this since it can be a stand alone.

It was thoroughly amusing at first when Grindelwald has continuously failed to create a polyjuice that would shift him into Graves form. The broken nose and the frayed nerves were definitely worth the snarling mess the wizard turned into when he was thwarted. Grindelwald had hung him from the rafters of an attic and had hunched over multiple cauldrons trying to find a potion that would hold a lasting transformation. Blood and hair and bone wouldn’t work, the potions turned to tar and burned to the bowls. 

Graves amusement was short lived, worthwhile as it was. Grindelwald took to physical beatings over magical, pummeled his ribs and kicked at Graves legs from his swaying suspension. After the anger was relieved the fickle blonde took to scouring books for long lasting transfigurations. Spells to alter the voice, mimic the gait. To curl the second toe on the left foot from where Graves had broken it a few too many times as a child. Incantations to darken the shoulders and add sun spots. Hair growth and ridges in the keratin on the nails. 

The finished product, an inch short and genetically missing a few too many things, was passable. Graves’ mother would tut and fix a few things before landing an indelicate left hook. His sister would chortle and with a flourish reveal the imitation she had perfected time and time again, the newest when Percival had reached forty. His brothers would bicker, attempt to disarm and bully the character into the ground. Percival was quite disappointed his father had passed at this point. Graves senior had nitpicked Percival until the day he died, he’d not hesitate to put the sorry excuse for a doppelgänger into their grave. 

As it was, his family was under strict orders to not approach because of the dangers of the job. They made their home in Vermont and kept to a wonderful magical village that adored Mrs.Graves and her tutoring the children. His brothers potioneers and his sister a talented seamstress. 

Graves was isolated in a cupboard. He hadn’t been carelessly cast away and left in the attic, in reach of potions ingredients and magic high in the air. A warded cupboard where he was left to rot. Where Grindelwald would come and adjust his teeth and the edges of his hairline, the way his eyes got puffy without sleep. It was disgusting. Graves had a particular distaste for the sneer that was mirrored at him. The lip not quite curled far enough, dangerous canines that had instinctually been barred at adversaries since childhood. 

Percival did his damnedest to remain calm, to meditate and to reach within his furiously attacked mind. His mother had taught him that the Graves family was known for their fight, the first who’d taken the name has crawled from a grave to finish their work. They didn’t have time to die and leave behind a mess. Percival kept thoughts of those memories alive and they burned him with determination. 

It was the starvation that was hardest. Withering hurt. Being weak, being constantly tired. Keeping his eyes open felt like war. Breathing and staying alive was all he could ask for. Graves’ mind ran in circles, stay aware and stay alive. Sleep was the best way to handle the deprivation. His eyes burned dreadfully when the dark wizard hounded him, his lungs choked on the smells of the city clinging to the man. 

Hours and days became hard to determine. This incarceration was the reason Graves had fought against isolation in prisons. The government couldn’t claim to be good when the wrongdoers were tortured for their acts. Passing of time became Grindelwald’s visits, the disarray of the man’s mimicked hair and the cycling of suits. After tie sticks and shoes started to lose their shine, after the hair pomade began to wear thin and cease to appear. 

When Graves’ jaw began to ache with disuse he took to singing. Nursery rhymes telling tales of wizarding kind, folk songs commemorating wars and cultural hymns. His grandparents would take his family camping and show them the old ways, when settlers had communed with the animals to survive. The creatures they’d shared blood with and gave their lives for. It made his heart ache to whisper, to think, to know that he may never see the shiny black spots in his sisters black coat. To see his Mother’s sleek form slink across the yard and flop gracelessly onto him while he watched his brothers tussle. 

Canaima had inhabited the americas for centuries and he may never see another panther whip its tail or bat a paw. He may never get to shift into the heavy jaguar he’d grown into in his teens. Percival may never take his sister into the woods to track rabbits and chase each other up trees. It was a despairing thought. Fuel in the fire burning in his gut, the will to live far from burnt out. 

Cycles of suits and cycles of shoes and cycles of shirts. Grindelwald has taken to his funeral attire, two black suits and four black shirts. They hid the blood, Graves reasoned, one morning after a particularly abusive fist met his face quite a few too many times. He woke with his head against the stand of the toilet and his back against the stem of the sink making up the furniture of his dwelling. 

A slice of bread waited on the edge of the sink. Not enough nutrients to pass a bowel movement, barely enough to help him walk from one end of the room to the next. Water kept him functioning, minimally, and standing to urinate has become and impossibility after the imposter had worn the same stick pins three times. Graves focused energy inward. The little bit forked in an uneven stream. 

Seventy percent energy to his magic, his life force and thirty to his heart. His heart kept his brain kept his lungs. His nails grew and his beard filled, was it an accurate time measurement when a corpse shrunk? When the skin receded and made an illusion of growth in the fibers. 

Time is an illusion. He’d read that once. Merlin and Morgana were they wrong. It was an unarguable mess of circumstances, of events causing chaos and life and death and harmony. It was Gerard marrying Magden. It was Percival, Tristan, Lancelot, Guinevere. It was Gwen crying when the boys went to war. It was Magden crying when they came back. Time was Percival’s bones aching from existing in a room long enough for him to lay in one direction if his legs split to accommodate the toilet. 

Graves had long since stripped to his boxer shorts and singlet, using his shirt and slacks as a pillow for his long rests on the hardwood flooring. Long days of listening to traffic and the house creaking. He felt like the house sometimes, he did know where it was or who’s it had been but he felt like the house with his sore ribs and cold toes. He’d broken his toes a few more times since his capture. Toes and arms were better than arms and legs, he supposed. 

Time was fear when his stomach started to ache, and burn. When he realized he’d been in his head for what felt like ages. Time was fear when he felt his chest seizing because he was going to die lying next to a fucking toilet, smelling like he’d bathed from a sink for who knows how long. Emaciated and lying in his underclothes.

Time was crashing downstairs. 

Time was shouting. 

Time was so loud. 

Time being loud back. 

Time was graves on his knees banging at the door of the tiny, cramped room. He was crying, and time was relief. 

Time was his hoarse voice catching in a whimper at faces he’d passed in the office, taking for granted the work his subordinates put into their cause. 

Time was Ramirez sweeping down and picking him up. Leaning into the auror’s neck to protect his eyes from the light when he was apparated to a medwing. 

Time was sitting in a bed, diagnostic charms fluttering around the room. Fleming, Fontaine, and Goldstein marching into the room looking like they’d walked through hell and back. 

Time was Tina nervously being nudged forwards, sitting on the edge of the bed. Looking at him through her lashes, bangs mussed and sticking to her forehead. Collar askew and blazer muddied. 

Time was Tina taking a few minutes to find her words. Fleming shuffling and Fontaine grabbing her shoulder to hold her still. Tina licking her lips and putting her heels on the rails of the bed. Turning her torso to him, looking him in the eye. 

“I’m sorry, we’re all so sorry, sir.” She frowned and looked at her hands, “He’s dead, though. We couldn’t stop him and bring him in. It was one or the other.” 

Goldstein bit her lip, hung her head in shame. Wringing her hands she whispered, “That’s why it took to long to find you, sir. We didn’t know it was him and then we had to put him down, and we’re so sorry sir.” The poor girl looked to nearly have tears in her eyes. 

Time was his aurors, his people running themselves ragged because “It’s been two weeks since we found out. It’s nearly Christmas, sir.”

Time was heaving a great sigh. 

“We’re resilient, Goldstein, it’s why we choose this job. It’s why we watch out for those who aren’t.” He reached out to her, put his hand on her arm. “By my grandmother’s grave, I’m certainly going to have nightmares but I assure you I’d take nightmares over never seeing the lot of you again.” He smiled at the three of them. Looking them in the eye, patting Tina on the arm. 

Time was the future, time was rehabilitation. Time was finding out why that sick fuck wore his face. Time was sitting with his family next to a fire or under the sun. Time was healing. 

There was time.


End file.
